So how long before movie theater ushers start doing pat-downs and walking guests through X-ray machines?

I didn't think it would happen quite so fast, but The Star-Ledger has an item today about an Edgewater theater that was evacuated during "The Dark Knight Rises" when someone opened the emergency exit door. Politicians raced to their staffers to bang out emotionally charged press releases calling for immediate action to finally — darn the Constitution — ban emergency exits from all public places. Emergency exits, those releases said, should be kept in the home only, and should not be used except for self-defenestration.

No, that didn't happen — yet — because politicians actually were too busy saying we need new, tougher gun laws, ideally the sort that would make it illegal to purchase, sell, manufacture, design, draw or even think about guns. That might actually solve the problem our existing gun laws haven't been able to do, though Texas would likely secede from the union. There's probably a drawback I'm not immediately seeing, though, so we'll table that for now.

Chris Christie doesn't want to talk about this right now, either. Here's another item from the Ledger from a presser Monday in the Statehouse:

"People were just killed over the weekend," he said. "Can we take a deep breath before politicians start sending out press releases? Can we allow the people to be mourned appropriately by their families before you have opportunistic politicians out there trying to make political points in an election year?"

Very sentimental and all, but it seems to me the best time to discuss gun control would be before a shooting like the one in Colorado. Failing that, right after a crisis seems like the best time, unless, of course, you're the NRA.

Do we need better gun laws? More enforcement of existing restrictions? How should I know; the most dangerous thing I get to play with at work is a pica pole. But we do need to have an honest conversation, not the kind of knee-jerk responses that have left everyone taking off their shoes in line for security at the airport. Why wait to start that dialog?

I'm even more irreverent on Twitter @joe_arney.